UMass Physics Contributes to Landmark Findings that Strengthen Evidence of New Physics

The Borexino prototype detector (CTF) shown here, a four-ton spherical scintillator target surrounded by ultra-pure water and 100 photomultiplier tubes, operated between 1994 and 2003. The tubes detect flashes of light from ionizing radiation (including neutrinos) occurring in the scintillating volume. A thin nylon "shroud" prevents radioactive contamination from entering the centermost volume of the detector. The main Borexino experiment has been taking data since 2007.

An international team of about 100 scientists of the Borexino Collaboration, including particle physicist Andrea Pocar at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, report in Nature, detection of neutrinos from the sun, directly revealing for the first time that the carbon-nitrogen-oxygen (CNO) fusion-cycle is at work in our sun.

Credit: Borexino Collaboration

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